The Backus Museum invites you to see and experience Daydreaming: Niki Butcher’s Hand-Painted Photography along with a very special Double Book Signing
Fort Pierce, Florida – March 5, 2025
The A.E. Backus Museum presents Daydreaming: Niki Butcher’s Hand-Painted Photography, the latest special exhibition of the 2024-25 season. Daydreaming features historical, beautiful, and sometimes quirky aspects of our world seen through the eyes of a thoughtful optimist, Niki Butcher. For decades, Butcher has focused her camera on the fading facades of old Florida, capturing funky “mom & pop” wayside businesses, lonesome sandy beaches, and the beauty of the Everglades. Remembering the gentle feeling of old Florida postcards, she hand paints her black and white photographs in vibrant tones and pastel hues that breathe life and imagination into these scenes, creating a picture of life far beyond what a camera could capture. Through her photography, Butcher captures places and people that stand out as beautiful, unique, endangered, and authentic, with a view that adds a bit more color, a good dose of humor, and an infusion of positivity. Daydreaming is on view at the A.E. Backus Museum & Gallery from March 7 through April 27, 2025 at 500 N. Indian River Drive in Historic Downtown Fort Pierce.
Niki Butcher has been photographing throughout the United States and beyond with her husband, legendary black-and-white photographer Clyde Butcher. After the death of their 17-year-old son, Butcher struggled to find purpose and hope. It was a decision to stop at an old orchid nursery in the middle of the Everglades that altered her life. During a solitary walk on the property, Butcher felt a healing peace, and for the first time since her son Ted’s death, she began to visualize what could be. As she began to daydream, she noticed a “For Sale” sign.
The decision to stop that day led the Butchers to purchase 13 acres of swampland in the middle of nearly a million acres in Big Cypress National Preserve. Over the next two decades, the two artists built a home and gallery. They invested their time and energy into introducing and inviting as many people into the swamp as possible. They hoped that once others experienced the beauty and uniqueness of the area, they would want to protect it.
The opening reception for Daydreaming: Niki Butcher’s Hand-Painted Photography is Friday, March 14 from 6:00-8:00 pm; current members are free, not-yet members are $20 or may join at the door. Niki and Clyde Butcher are both expected to attend. Additionally, the Museum is arranging a very special opportunity on Saturday, March 15 to coincide with the exhibition.
On Saturday, March 15 from 1:00-3:00 pm, Featured Exhibiting Artist Niki Butcher with Special Guest Clyde Butcher will be signing their most recent publications:
”Daydreaming” by Niki Butcher [$75]
“Lifeworks in Photography” by Clyde Butcher [$225]
“National Parks” by Clyde Butcher [$64.95]
2026 Clyde Butcher Calendar [$24.95]
*FREE ADMISSION DURING SIGNING*
Niki Butcher (b. 1944) began focusing her camera on Florida thirty years ago, inspired by the old shacks on sagging stilts, conch homes in the Florida Keys, a lonesome sandy beach in the Ten Thousand Islands, or the mysterious cypress strands of the Everglades. Remembering the tender, surreal feeling of those old post cards advertising the beauties of the Sunshine State, Niki chooses to interpret her photographic images by hand-painting the scenes in colors that represented her feeling at the time she took the photograph. Her hand-painted photographs bring another dimension to the back and white photography, bringing an artist’s unique view of the magnificent as well as the jocular side of Florida.
A legendary photographer and national treasure, the scale and extraordinary clarity of Clyde Butcher‘s (b. 1941) work sets it apart as exceptional. In the tradition of the nineteenth-century Hudson River School painters, Clyde composes his works at pristine and untarnished locations across the United States, creating arresting compositions that distinctly mark him as the foremost landscape photographer in America today. Among a lifetime of honors and achievements, he is recognized in the Florida Artists Hall of Fame and is a recent distinguished recipient of the National Medal of the Arts (2024) for his “outstanding contributions to the excellence, growth, support and availability of the arts in the United States.”
This is the only planned book signing to take place on the east coast of Florida featuring Clyde Butcher during 2025. If individuals are interested in meeting Clyde and Niki Butcher, purchasing one of their books, and having it signed, there will not be a better time in the region this year.
ALL DATES AND PROGRAMMING SUBJECT TO CHANGE; PLEASE CHECK THE WEBSITE FOR ANY UPDATES OR CANCELLATIONS.
About the A.E. Backus Museum & Gallery
Since its founding in 1960 and the first day the doors opened in 1961, the A.E. Backus Museum & Gallery has been a center and catalyst for creativity and culture in our region. The Museum houses the nation’s largest public presentation of artwork by Florida’s preeminent painter, A.E. “Bean” Backus (1906-1990), and also continues its more than sixty-year tradition of exhibiting and celebrating the paintings of the original Florida Highwaymen, who got their start here. In addition, the Museum organizes and hosts changing exhibitions from artists of regional, national and international acclaim. The Backus Museum was recognized as the 2022 Best of the Best Community Choice Award for Best Art Gallery; and the 2021 Best Tourist Attraction – 2018 Best Museum / Best of the Treasure Coast by the readers of Indian River Magazine.
Schedule: Regular Hours Wednesday – Saturday, 10 AM to 4 PM; Sunday, 12 Noon to 4 PM. The Museum is closed Easter Sunday. Admission is $5 per person; AARP, AAA, and Veterans with appropriate ID receive a $2 discount. Students with school ID, children under 18, active duty military, and current members are always free. Visitors are asked to follow the latest public health guidance for the safety and comfort of guests, staff, and volunteers.
